Land use since 1900
In the second half of the 20th century the area of farmland and of nature dwindled, but there was an increase in the area of woodland and forest and an even bigger increase in the area of built-up land.
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Trends
The steady dwindling of natural areas since 1900 has recently halted. By contrast, the area of woodland and forest remained constant for the first half of the 20th century and increased gradually thereafter. From 1900 until about 1950 the agricultural area increased: prior to 1940 primarily as a result of reclamation and after 1945 primarily because of the empoldering of the Zuiderzee. The main causes of the decrease in the agricultural area since the 1950s are residential and industrial development, and infrastructure.
Technical note
The data series relates solely to scheduled local authority land. The huge increase in such land in 1949/1950 and 1957/1958 may have influenced the area of natural land. The data series displays several abrupt changes in trend that may be related to changes in classification and/or measuring method. Such changes occurred in 1949/1950, 1976/1977 and 1989/1993.
The built-up area comprises the sum of the land use statistics on residential areas and industrial estates. As the statistics for 1945 are unreliable, the data for 1946 have been shown instead. Supplementary data (especially CBS, 2000 and Dirkse et al., 2002) have been used to calculate the areas of forest and agricultural land.
Here, the nature areas are exclusively the wet or dry nature areas. Farmland nature areas, managed to benefit wildlife (flower-rich meadows and nutrient-poor acid grasslands, for example) have been included in the category "agricultural area".
References
- CBS (1994). Vijfennegentig jaren statistiek in tijdreeksen 1899-1994. Centraal Bureau voor de Statistiek. Heerlen/Voorburg.
- CBS (2000). De landbouwtelling 2000. Centraal Bureau voor de Statistiek. Heerlen/Voorburg.
- Dirkse, G.M., W.P. Daamen en H. Schoonderwoerd (2002). Het Nederlandse bos in 2001. Expertise Centrum LNV. Wageningen.
- Visser, H (2000). Bodemgebruik in Nederland. Kwartaalbericht Milieustatistieken 2000/2: 5-9.
